


Nought but Grief and Pain (for Promis'd Joy)

by Hedgi



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Introspection, Pre-Suicide Mission, all aboard the pain train, essentially thoughts of suicide, reaction fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2017-01-25
Packaged: 2018-09-19 19:52:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9458021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hedgi/pseuds/Hedgi
Summary: Keith has always been many things.  Stupid has never been one of them.  Impulsive, sure. Reckless, yes. Intense, quiet, alone—check, check, check.  But not stupid.What’s the point in looking for another way, another plan, when all they need is another person on board Zarkon's ship?Introspection reaction to "The Best laid Plans"





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the same poem as the episode title, Robert Burns' 'To a Mouse'   
> The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men  
> Gang aft agley,  
> An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,  
> For promis'd joy

Keith has always been many things.  Stupid has never been one of them.  Impulsive, sure. Reckless, yes. Intense, quiet, alone—check, check, check.  But not stupid. Even when he left Garrison _, (kicked out asked to leave his own choice acting out shutting down alone alone alone)_ no one ever thought stupid. And neither did he.  With the same practical clarity that he uses for all the ordinary things, the day to day things, knowing how many meals he can get out of his last sack of flour and gold-skinned potatoes, or what angle he has to hold his arm, his sword, to block a strike, he looks at the problem that waits, looming like the starless spots between far off stars. It’s a list of facts that lead to facts that lead to facts, like measurements of calories, like the math behind what speed to fly at what angle to dodge a chunk of rock floating out there.

  1. Thace is no longer part of the mission. The why doesn’t matter, the how doesn’t matter. Emotions don’t count, not here. Not now.
  2. Without Thace on the inside, there is no way to shut down the Galra ship.
  3. Without shutting down the ship, even Pidge can’t install that virus.
  4. Without the virus, the plan will fail.
  5. The plan fails, and there are no second chances.
  6. The plan fails, and everyone will die.
  7. Everyone means everyone. It means Hunk and Coran and the Princess and the Blade and Pidge and Lance and Shiro and Voltron and Hope. It means the family he doesn’t know and the family he does.



So it’s simple. Standing there with everyone gathered, holding breath, trying to come up with a last ditch option, Keith knows the easy answer. Someone has to get on that ship, to take Thace’s role. Someone has to shut down that ship. What’s the point in looking for another way, when all they need is another person?

Someone who can use Galra tech. Someone who can fight. Someone who can be replaced.

He has no one on Earth waiting up nights for word, for his return. He can fight. His tainted blood may as well be used for this as anything else. It makes sense, after all. He, of everyone here, has the least to lose.

Maybe this is why the Red Lion chose him, why the Blue Lion called to him, in those cold desert nights. Maybe they knew, in that way they have of understanding so much more than anyone guesses. He thinks he’d like that. To have a purpose. To have had a reason for all of this, for all of the fighting and the fear and the losing. To have some destiny.

Besides, he doesn’t really fit here, not anymore. The Princess’s wary glances, the comments Hunk seems to think are reassuring but only hammer in the truth. He never fit at Garrison, either, so maybe this was to be expected.  It hurts, but if he can do this, it won’t have been for nothing.

 _I’ll do it._ His voice does not shake, neither do his knees as he stands, facing the Princess.   
_What?_ She says, and his resolve strengthens.   
_I’ll sneak onto Zarkon’s ship. I’m Galra so I’ll be able to interact with their technology._ He lays it out, the way it sits in his mind, a series of check-boxes, a line of dominos.  His eyes slide to Pidge as he asks her to put cloaking on a pod, the way she did on Green. He ignores the pause, the hesitation in her shift to face him. Does she think he can’t do it? Does she think he won’t? The Galra took more from her than anyone here but the Alteans. He had thought she trusted him. He does not sigh with relief when she says she can. There is no time for that.  
_Going onto Zarkon’s ship is a suicide mission,_ the Blade with the white braid says, and Keith wants to shout that he knows. He knows and he understands, but the Blade continues. Keith thinks that he hears guilt in the words, _would never command someone so inexperienced to go on a mission so dangerous._ But there’s no time for guilt, either, and it’s beside the point, because this isn’t a command. This isn’t like putting on the armor because there was nothing else to do, this isn’t like watching Shiro and Pidge run down a hallway while he went looking for Red. He could sit and wait, like everyone else seems willing to do, to try and fail to find another plan, but there isn’t one. There is only this plan, this moment, this choice, and he has made it.

 _No one’s commanding me,_ he says, voice calm, voice firm, because that’s all it can be, because there’s no point in saying anything else in any other way. Screaming, or crying, won’t change what has to happen. _I’m doing it._ He sees the Princess’s eyes go hard. He understands, kind of. She hates him, but there’s nothing he can do about that. All he can do is this.

He can tell Shiro wants to stop him, that Shiro’s thinking about his arm, about going himself. But Shiro has a mom back home, and the Holts, and pure human blood, and Keith can’t let him make that sacrifice again. Besides, he’s the sword of Voltron. This is how things are meant to go.

Pidge hurries to ready a pod, the whole castle somehow humming with energy and still at the same time, everyone waiting and watching for the moment when everything ends and everything starts. Keith follows Pidge down to the pods, not meeting Shiro’s eyes, Lance’s, Hunk’s. It’s not that saying Goodbye makes things too real, but somehow he still doesn’t want to stand there, with them full of pity and regret and false hope.  Saying goodbye to Red would be worse, feeling her purr in his bones. He walks past her hangar. He can’t take her, not even for that last bit of comfort. Zarkon can’t get her, and she has to be here, for someone to fly. Maybe the Princess will, or Coran. Keith stifles a smile at the thought of the four little mice perched on the dash, clinging to the levers. Maybe Matt Holt. He was always a good kind of guy. Red would like him, Keith thinks.

The pod is ready, Pidge wavering like she wants to say something. Footsteps stop her, and the Princess is there. Watching him. He doesn’t really listen to what she says, her voice hard, angry, _The Galra, they’ve done terrible things._ He knows. He knows. He can name a hundred planets destroyed, and doesn’t she know that’s why he’s doing this, to stop them? _I wanted to hate you,_ she says, and he stops her.   
_Allura,_ he says, _It’s—_ and he wants to say it’s ok. It’s all ok and he understands and none of that matters anymore. Not at all. She can hate him as much as she likes, and he won’t care anymore after this, because he’ll be dead. But she interrupts.

 _But it’s not you,_ she says like her heart is breaking with understanding. _It’s me. My anger has blinded me for too long,_ and then she’s there, against him, and it’s almost as if she is the one about to die, and him comforting her as she says she’s sorry, that it’s not what’s in his blood that counts but who he is. But she’s wrong. His blood counts. And she’s right, because it’s more than blood. He is Keith, and he is Galra, and he is going to fight his way through Zarkon’s ship and shut it down so that it can be destroyed.   
  
_Please come back to us,_ she says, and he nods.   
_I will._ Maybe it’s a lie. Maybe it’s hope. He’s prepared either way.

It is all ready, and as he puts a hand on the side of the pod, it is like weight off his shoulders, pressure lifting from his lungs. He knows what he has to do.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Not even sorry. reactions welcome. :)


End file.
